Magnetic

Chapter Seven

It was finally Friday, and I had almost survived a full week at this school. I, for the most part, had my classes memorized and was able to name a few people in each. Every day, like I predicted, I had been invited to eat lunch with Gage and his friends, something that I appreciated a lot but didn't really want to admit aloud to them.

"Guys," Paisley began, putting a hand on each of the boys' arms and almost knocking over her open water bottle. "Guess what."

"What?" both of them asked at the exact same time. They high-fived each other, thinking it was hilarious. To me, it sounded kind of creepy.

Paisley bit her lips, looking back and forth at each of them. "I got a new camera."

"Finally!" Gage exclaimed before taking a large bite of his chicken sandwich. "We're in dire need of a new one after that idiot, Tyler, dropped the one we bought with the donation money."

"Camera?" I asked them, my eyebrows furrowed.

"For the newspaper," he told me.

"Newspaper?"

With a roll of his eyes, Gage explained further. "You know, the club? We create the school newspaper."

"We interview people," Paisley put up one finger, "take pictures," another finger.

"It sounds completely lame, we know," Brady said, reading my mind. I blushed, wondering if my expression was totally transparent. "But it's actually pretty fun. You get to write and take pictures for the whole school to see. Or, a portion of the school."

Paisley nodded and munched on a pretzel stick-her daily lunch. "Not like everybody buys the newspaper. Sometimes, we have to give it away for free. Which completely sucks and doesn't help with our issue of funds, but the students need to see it."

"We've been assisting with the Lit Lamp since each of our sophomore years," Brady informed me. "Everyone on the team is really close."

"I bet," I replied.

None of them crossed me as the type of people who'd be in newspaper. To be honest, if I still lived in New York and Gage told me he was on the newspaper team at his school, I'd probably laugh at him. But by the way the three of them were talking about it, they seemed like they really liked it.

"There's only ten people on newspaper, including us," Paisley told me after counting on her fingers.

"Maybe you could join the team, Nicki," Brady suggested.

I shrugged. It didn't really sound like something that I'd be into.

I didn't want to be in any clubs or teams at West Cliff until I got used to the school. Most of my teachers had each suggested a club that they were hosting, so instead of just saying no, that had been my excuse all day. "Maybe," I said, not wanting to shoot down the invitation so quickly.

"People can't join after first quarter," Gage told Brady. "It's second semester."

"Oh, yeah," Brady replied, reaching under his hair to rub his forehead, his cheeks flushing a deep shade of pink. "I forgot."

"Besides, not like Nicki would like it anyway." Gage took a last bite of his chicken sandwich right as the bell signaling for us to go to fifth period rang, students all around the cafeteria jumping up to dash to their next class.

After I threw away my empty chip bag, Paisley grabbed my arm. "Nicki, look!" she whispered, nodding toward an extremely tall guy with dark hair in front of us. "Do you see him?"

"Yeah."

"That's Trent Loggens. He has the prettiest blue eyes."I couldn't tell. I could only see his back, which was covered with a dark gray fleece jacket. "What about him?"